In the first few years of its existence, the Neuroradiology Education and Research Foundation concentrated mostly on positioning itself to help promote the specialty of neuroradiology in the 21st century. A few fellowships were given out, with the goal of demonstrating the economic importance of neuroradiology procedures in the diagnosis and treatment of neurological disease, and one project was sponsored that helped to establish MR angiography as the inital procedure of choice in the work-up of cerebrovascular disease. However, the Foundation mostly concentrated on building reserves that would allow the support of larger projects in order to help larger numbers of neuroradiologists. Under the wise guidance of Burt Drayer, we steadfastly moved toward that goal and your Foundation is now positioning itself to play a much larger role in the continuing education and training of neuroradiologists.

Starting with the most recent Annual Meeting in Boston, focus sessions are now being captured digitally and will be available for review at home or office and for CME credit on the Foundation web site; as this site grows, it will become invaluable for our members studying for the CAQ exam. The Foundation hopes to be able to support members in training in their efforts to attend the Annual Meeting. With support from the Foundation, we hope to create more hands-on learning opportunities at the Annual Meeting, building on the start that was accomplished in the sessions in Boston. More fellowships will be supported, as only research by neuroradiologists will keep neuroradiologists in the forefront of clinical neuroradiology in our increasingly competitive field and, more importantly, time for research is no longer easily found in private or academic practices. Appreciation of this fact by the ASNR Research Committee has resulted in a proposal by that committee that the Foundation should help to support neuroradiologists who are recipients of prestigious NIH K23 awards. The Foundation Board of Trustees is currently considering this proposal.

In the future, the NER Foundation will provide the resources for many of the education and research goals of the Society. Our future is dependent upon its success. In order for the Foundation to help our specialty to grow and prosper, to help us to better treat our patients, and to help our members fight off the challenges facing our specialty, we will have to grow, in a manner similar to the RSNA Research and Education Foundation, to the point where we can support a wide range of continuing educational and research projects that will help to keep our specialty and our members at the cutting edge of Neuroimaging science and performance. To achieve these goals will require continued, and additional, support from our membership, as well as increasing support from our friends in industry and, hopefully, friends in other businesses and organizations that have goals similar to ours, but no direct mechanisms for attaining them.

Neuroradiology is a specialty with a proud past and a great future. Day in and day out, neuroradiologists continue to provide irreplaceable services for patients with diseases of the central nervous system, head, and neck. With the support of the ASNR membership and its friends, the NER Foundation is dedicated to helping neuroradiologists to continue and improve these services to our patients.

- Eric J. Russell, MD, FACR